


We're Not Really Strangers

by tangledinfairylights



Category: Hermitcraft RPF
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Closure, Gen, Lack of Communication, THE FIC, i have 85409 series in progress why am i writing this, this wasn't a wip plan until two days ago, what is this honestly, zedpulse finally communicates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-03
Updated: 2020-12-03
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:54:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27860357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tangledinfairylights/pseuds/tangledinfairylights
Summary: How are Zedaph and Impulse's relationship, when Tango's not around to keep them together? Some say they're the best of friends, although more people had stated they have never seen the two alone together — and a few admitted the relationship had been quite strained.Still, between multiple portals and chicken randomisers, whether Zedaph and Impulse realised or not... they’re never really that different.
Relationships: impulseSV & Zedaph (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 50





	We're Not Really Strangers

Today’s weather had been _violent._

Impulse had flown off from his base to run errands at the Shopping District, with a hubris-filled convincing to himself that _it’s just a drizzle, it’s fine._

It was _not_ fine. Now he’s stuck on the Impulse Buys section of the Barge, hair wet, unable to fly home without getting himself fried off from the thunder, much less walk without arriving home with every inch of his skin trembling from the cold.

Usually, he’d never minded rains much — but today the sky seemed extremely at war with anything and everything, and showed it — flashes of blinding light between the otherwise-dark Shopping District, followed by the growls and grouches of thunder threatening everyone who even _dared_ to come forth. To return to his base, whether by flight or on foot, would be too dangerous — so he’s stuck here until the rage above calmed down.

But for _how long_? 

He tapped his foot impatiently. There’s tonnes of projects he’s been dying to finish, and now _all_ of them had to be postponed — even one minute of tardiness was annoying to Impulse — so thanks, Mother Nature. 

Not knowing what else to do, he continued his very entertaining pastime of staring at the deafening storm hitting the glass windows of the Barge, feeling himself about to doze asleep — when a ruckus was heard from downstairs.

“Owie — hadjah!”

_That’s Zedaph’s voice._

Impulse peered downstairs, to see his fellow Hermit standing on the doorway like a deer in headlights, _stupidly_ standing _outside_ amidst the thunderstorm when shelter is _five footsteps away_ , come on now...

“Why are you out —“ he shook his head, “come inside, quick! Are you okay?” He jumped down, forgetting the existence of staircases. “Are you okay, oh my God you’re soaked —“

Zedaph didn’t seem to acknowledge Impulse’s presence. “Where did that go,” he muttered to himself, spinning around in circles at the Barge’s entrance. “I swear it was there earlier...”

“Zedaph?”

He stopped in an abrupt halt.

“Hi, Impulse,” he absently said. “There was a rabbit and I went and chased it because I ran out of rabbit’s foot for my Combrewter and now it’s gone and now —“ he took a breath, seemingly just now recognising his surroundings — “I’m stuck here until the storm’s over, I guess.”

Impulse shook his head. “Well, there’s no good trying to go back.”

“Yeah.”

He eyed Zedaph curiously. 

_This was actually the first time they’re alone together in a while._

Now that he thought about it, as he sized Zedaph up... when was the last time they actually spent time together as friends?

Wait.

He’s _trembling._

After a stupid internal debate on whether he should do this or not, Impulse went to one of the chests, pulling out a T-shirt with Grian’s face on a loaf of bread on it. 

“Go get changed. You’re going to get a cold.”

Zedaph stared blankly at the shirt. 

“You —“ he started, “how — how much is this?”

Impulse forced a smile — oh, he hoped it didn’t came ingenuine. How could he forgot to smile, the friendly neighbourhood Impulse, all of a sudden?

“It’s on me, shh. I know you’re broke. Plus, Grian would definitely hook me up.”

“Alright, I guess.” 

A second of hesitation.

“Don’t look,” Zedaph _also_ forced a laugh, despite the little humourous _glorified-clown_ (his words, not Impulse’s) that he usually was. 

“I — I wasn’t planning to.”

“Yeah. I was joking,” he said. “It was a joke.”

Impulse shrugged, turning his back to watch the thunderstorm out the window once more. 

_Back then, he would’ve comically put his hand over his eyes and start a loud countdown only to annoy Zed._

_He would’ve thrown Zed Grian’s merch without any warning, and he would’ve accepted it with a laugh — not whatever awkward dialogue they had earlier. They would’ve joked about the Grain printed on the fabric, probably start a parody of a cooking show’s judging scene and rate all the things in the Barge._

_Or maybe they would’ve just sucked it up and fly home, hold hands when the storm gets more violent while complaining about cooties. Probably crash at Tango’s to watch as his eyes widen in horror at the mess they would create in his base — heh. Okay, no._

_Yeah, somehow all of those stopped being the case._

“Oh, f — iddlesticks!” 

Impulse stopped staring at the window and glanced at his friend. Zedaph shook his communicator, dramatically pointing it upwards as he squinted. “Of course there’s no signal,” he muttered, most likely to himself.

“Hm?” 

“Thunderstorm’s affecting Cub’s parabolic signal system something,” Zedaph said.

“Mine didn’t had any problems,” Impulse decided to suck it up and just _do the small talk, dammit_. “I thought we’re using the phone tower near Xisuma’s?”

Zedaph pocketed his communicator back, dissatisfied at his attempts of finding a signal. “Yeah. I tweaked mine so it would connect to Cub’s instead. The Town Hall is way closer than X’s place.”

“Oh.” _Quick, say something witty so the conversation won’t die_. “You seem to do that a lot.”

“What,” he turned his head, staring directly at Impulse’s eyes, “doing things the complicated way when there’s a conventional one? I do what I like, thanks.”

_Dang it._

_Why was he so defensive?_

“That wasn’t what I meant,” Impulse said, “don’t be so snappy for nothing.”

No replies. Zedaph seemed quite engrossed in whatever was wrong with his communicator, and though he didn’t say a word, Impulse knew — he wanted him to _shut up and mind his own business._

And he didn’t say a word, but Impulse started to think what Zedaph was probably thinking as well. _Snappy? Tell that to the mirror_ , a voice spoke up in his head. _Oh, the guy who stopped replying to Zedaph and Tango’s invitations to hang out. So busy, always so occupied with projects after projects, can’t even separate five minutes for some fun._

_Whose fault was that when they stopped trying to spend time with all three of you at once?_

_You stopped giving them a chance in the first place, didn’t you? And led them to months of uneasiness? The glue trying his best to keep everything together, and the forgotten one you barely considered a friend this season?_

Impulse sighed.

This was going to be a _long_ storm.

* * *

Upon his frustration at the lack of interaction, (well, at least the raging storm helped make it less an awkward silence), Impulse started talking to himself. Zedaph didn’t seem to mind. He had been talking to Grian’s Horse the past five minutes himself anyway.

Funny, somehow the vibe around the two had been so weird that nothing is weird anymore. From base plans to industrial plans to even Resistance plans, though he didn’t mention the actual rebellion’s name out loud, Impulse felt like he could’ve created an entire podcast.

“Maybe we could... look up more on the Nether mechanics, and, well, it’s fine if we had to change the portals. I mean, I won’t do it for a long while if it’s a big renovation, but it would be convenient to have four portals for each side...”

“The best way to do it is always the divide-by-eight trick.”

For a second there, Impulse thought Zedaph was still talking to Grian’s Horse.

“What?”

Zedaph stopped petting Grian’s Horse, turning to Impulse who’s on the other side of the Barge. “Portals. You wanted to make multiple portals for multiple sides of your base?”

Impulse blinked, dumbfounded. He forgot that Zedaph could actually _hear_ his nonsense, no matter how invisible he was in his eyes at the moment. 

“Yeah?”

“I do that.” Zedaph stepped closer to Impulse’s side of the Barge, sitting on a shulker box. “It’s actually quite simple. But then again,” he averted Impulse’s eyes once more, “your base is a symmetrical work of art and mine’s a hot mess, so that’s a variable I didn’t have to consider.”

Oh, wow. 

_How did he never noticed that? Zedaph’s portal was just a stair-flight from his._

“That’s cool,” Impulse said at last. _Would you mind showing me after it’s safe enough for us to go outside,_ was what he didn’t say.

And Zedaph only nodded, so it didn’t seem like he would offer to do so himself either.

They continued about their own business of monologues and dramatic stares outside the sky, (if you could even call it business), when a phrase made Impulse’s ears perk up in interest.

“...chicken randomisers,”

“You use chicken randomisers as well?” he asked despite himself, _how impulsive._ “What for?”

“Aquarium,” Zedaph replied. The reply was curt, and short and was nowhere near sweet, as every other reply that day, but Impulse’s eyes shined at the word. _Tropical fishies and dolphins and coral reefs and the scent of salty water and sand and those pebbles that look like Nerds candies..._

“You have an aquarium?” Impulse stepped out from his position at the window at last, sitting down next to Zedaph, who slightly inched away. “How come I never know these things?”

“Well,” Zedaph fidgeted on the hem of Grian’s merchandise T-shirt, “you’ve never asked. Nor visited, actually.”

_Uh-oh. He went there._

_Quick, don’t say anything dumb again._

“I — well, I’ve been busy,” Impulse said. “I don’t know why I’ve never visited either.”

Zedaph seemed to find the spruce trapdoor quite interesting all of a sudden, for he kept staring at the item. “Maybe if I have iron and gunpowder you’d visit more,” he muttered.

“It was a joke,” he quickly added, turning to face Impulse. “I was joking.”

Impulse honestly didn’t know what to say.

“So, chicken randomisers,” he ended up saying, to which Zedaph said “Right!” with a blinding bright smile, the corners of his mouth forming prominent lines.

“I’ve been using them as well, but they might seem to set off too often. I don’t know.”

“What are you using them for?” Zedaph’s eyes shined just after he asked. For a split second, he grinned, like the old little gremlin that had stuck with Impulse for years. “Oh, I know.”

“Bet.”

“You’ve been using them for your little mycelium shenanigans,” Zedaph stood up, looking extremely pleased with himself. “Of course —“

“How’d you know that?!” Impulse knew his pitch was higher than anything, but he paid no mind. “And you’re going to tell —“

“No,” Zedaph shook his head, an angelic smile on his face. “I’m neutral. Always neutral. Whatever conflicts you two get up to I’ve always been neutral.”

Impulse could _feel_ a genuine laugh forming on the tip of his tongue — still, left unsaid all the same.

And the silence returned.

Prominent silence, hanging down and encasing the duo with its whispers of nothingness, as if a fog that blurred everything around, a cloud that formed a lump in Impulse’s throat, making it harder for him to talk. 

And it felt louder than ever — the silence. Even Zedaph stopped chattering to Grian’s Horse, instead absently stroking the equestrian without a word. It’s worse now that they were _extremely close_ to finding closure — and _bailed_ at the last second, too scared to speak up.

Zedaph cleared his throat. 

“Oh,” he said, his voice small, “the storm’s over.”

Impulse glanced up at the open ceiling.

_Oh, yeah, he’s right. It was over._

_So, now what,_ he thought, eyeing Zedaph who’s petting the bony neck of Grian’s Horse. _Should he just leave? Say good-bye, at least? That would’ve been awkward. But just leaving would be worse..._

“Hey,” Zedaph said, breaking Impulse off his overthinking. “So, I’m going back to my base—“

“Me too,” Impulse said at once. “So yeah.”

_Oh, he just cut Zedaph’s words off._

_Great._

Zedaph tightened his elytra, waiting for a good few seconds of more silence before speaking up once more. 

“You know, man. I know I said I’m neutral and all,” he stepped closer to where Impulse stood, “but if you ever seek to optimise this chicken randomiser, I’m always up for some science.”

He patted his shoulder with a slight smile. “You know where I am if you need me.”

With that, he stuffed a bunch of rockets to his blue-jeans pocket, about to take off.

And Impulse _knew_ , if he didn’t say anything, he would regret it forever. Even Mother Nature had to take part in reuniting the used-to-be inseparables together. No chance like right now.

“Um. Zed?”

 _Zed. Not Zed_ aph _._

_He hadn’t used that nickname in a while._

Zedaph turned, absently setting off one lit rocket to the sky.

“Yes?”

“Is your Cave of Contraptions prepared for visitors? Like, right now?” he rushed through the sentence in one breath.

And Zed, bless him — broke into an even wider grin than Impulse had ever seen in their eight years of on-and-off friendship. 

“Wow. Yes,” he said, still unable to contain the way the corners of his lips curled up. “You know what?” he burned another rocket, winking at Impulse. “Last one to go through my sky-high fly-by don’t-die door is a rotten egg!”

And he flew off with a laugh.

**Author's Note:**

> the world needs more zedpulse content where tangos not around I SAID WHAT I SAID xo


End file.
